Cassandra Kresnov 5: Operation Shield (20 page)

“I don't want them to protect me! I've got you and Danya to protect me!”

Sandy sighed and held the shaking girl. She'd known this wouldn't be easy. Now she learned how and why.

Vanessa and Phillippe postponed a dinner engagement to help out. Sandy thanked them profusely—Danya and Kiril had been okay alone that morning and would probably be okay again, but it wasn't fair on them, and on Kiril especially. They knew and liked Vanessa, and it was about time they met Phillippe, who was lots of fun with kids and not so secretly itching to have some of his own. Plus he'd brought his violin, needing to practise at least five hours a day, so Danya and Kiril would get to see some truly amazing musicianship.

Meanwhile, Sandy and Svetlana were having a night out. First they took Sandy's cruiser and got some takeout, which was a long-established tradition in Tanusha, and some of the takeout places (or flyout places, they were often called) were top quality. They ate while flying circles about Tanusha, which traffic central frowned at and wouldn't allow more than one circuit, but most people circumvented with all kinds of trivial landings and takeoffs at places they'd no interest in visiting. Sandy having the security clearance she did, central didn't even query her route.

So they sat, and ate, and watched the sunset, and the never-endingly amazing view of one of humanity's biggest cities, as sunlight faded and the city lights came on, and Svetlana got that awestruck look in her eyes once more that she'd had on that first night's arrival. Even Sandy still got that look when she was not too preoccupied to notice.

Then they went to Safdajung District and landed amidst the flashing lights of a shopping district's major sale, and sent the cruiser on wheels to find itself
a park in some underground lot. Svetlana's eyes goggled at the streetscape, kaleidoscopic displays and colours everywhere, thousands of people, streetside entertainers, daring outfits. But it was not the shopping nor the nightlife that Sandy had brought her to see…or not
this
nightlife, anyhow. The kind accessible to the mainstream crowds.

Down some smaller side streets, bustling with restaurants and entertainment parlours, a few very unsuitable for kids, but nothing could possibly shock a girl from the mean streets of Droze. Then some nondescript stairs beside a tavern entrance and down the most boring stairway yet seen, through the outer door, then a knock on the inner door, for those not thoroughly put off by the bland whitewash…and answered by a seven-foot-tall Asian man dressed like a woman. With what looked like a giant pineapple on his head.

“Cassandra, darling!” he shouted, and stooped to kiss her on each cheek with enormous ruby lips. “
Wonderful
to see you, and it looks like you've been in the wars again.”

“You know me, Nánguā,” she said.

“And oh, my goodness, who is this?” Stooping further to admire Svetlana. “Isn't she adorable? One of yours?” Looking at Sandy as though she must have done something naughty to acquire her.

“If only I could get them that way.”

“Oh, I think this breeding thing is catching, even you synthetics will be doing it next.” Sandy thought of the GIs operating the underground factory in Chancelry HQ on Droze and thought he wasn't far wrong. And to Svetlana, “Adorable child, my name is Nánguā, but if your Chinese is as bad as most of Tanusha's, you can call me Pumpkin. And what's your name?”

“Svetlana.” Sandy didn't think it was so much shyness as astonishment. Svetlana had seen many things on Droze, but nothing like Pumpkin.

“What a lovely name! Now child, do you have anything to wear? You see, I don't know if Cassandra's actually told you what this is about, but this party's kind of about…well,
wearing
things. What do you like to wear?”

Beyond Pumpkin was a party worthy of a seven-foot-tall transvestite in a ball gown with a pineapple on his head (“If his name's Pumpkin,” Svetlana asked her an hour later, “why is he wearing a pineapple?”). It was co-run by Togo, of course, one of Sandy's friends via Ari, whom she didn't get to see nearly often enough and was now delighted to have an excuse. Togo was
one of Tanusha's cooler underground fashion designers, not those awful mainstreamers with their displays of mass-market grotesquery; that was “beef steak fashion,” clothing for cattle, disdained by those present.

These parties were fashion as fun, with little fitting rooms behind curtains rigged against the walls where local designers would run the latest hot fabric tech to knock up outfits in just a few minutes with the help of holodesigns and VR space, showing off their latest thought bubbles and outdoing each other for new ideas on a moment's inspiration, like musicians riffing competing solos in some downtown club. A person shouldn't walk into such a party if they weren't prepared to get changed numerous times…and there was of course also lively music, excellent if spontaneous catering, and lots of dancing and socialising.

It wasn't conceived with children in mind, of course, but it was hardly risqué nor swirling with illegality, and Sandy had just had a hunch about the kind of thing Svetlana might like to see. Might need to see. Nice people. Fun people. Crazy and wild and utterly unpredictable people of all shapes, colours, sizes, and preferences…and all completely harmless, creative, and non-threatening. This was not an image of human interactions that Svetlana had ever conceived of. Adults made her wary, and outside of her own little circle, people only interacted with other people for profit or power, in her mind at least.

But it was hard to sit on a bar ledge, with a glass of bubbly apple juice in one hand, amidst crowds of crazy-dressed, dancing, laughing people, and explain to an exotic black girl with hair like some fantastical spider and wearing ten-inch heels, exactly what her favourite colours and fabrics were, and still think of human interaction as something frightening and dangerous. The noise and crowds might have bothered Danya, but Sandy didn't think Svetlana would mind, and sure enough, soon she was ducking behind curtains and emerging in a pretty floral dress, then a girly “pop idol” skirt, then some tight and sparkly pants, and suggesting various hats and shoes from her new crowd of adult friends. Because Svetlana, when she was confident, could command a crowd like an empress. She'd seen genuinely scary things, and little things like public attention didn't bother her, so long as she had the power, or at least the upper hand.

“Well,
she's
a little princess,” said Togo, sharing a more alcoholic beverage
with Sandy by the bar. He wore a lavender, sparkly shirt, exposing strong black arms, and had a few more piercings than Sandy recalled. No one was bothering Sandy with the dress-up routine, seeing her arm and other injuries, but every now and then a new hat was placed on her head, with some new decoration, at an appropriately jaunty angle. The current one was a beret. Sandy saw it in the bar mirror and thought…maybe. When her hair was longer.

“She is a little princess,” Sandy agreed.

“So now do you finally come to see the affinity between girls and dressing up?”

Sandy laughed. “I see almost as many boys here as girls.”

“Yes, but when we were her age,” pointing to Svetlana, “we were doing our dress-ups privately, in our mothers’ wardrobes.”

“Surely not,” Sandy teased.

“No, it's true,” Togo insisted. “And even more shy when the boy is heterosexual.”

“You know, I hear heterosexual glamour boys are the new queers.”

“Oh, shucks,” said Togo. “Flatterer.”

Over in Svetlana's corner, the curtain came back dramatically, revealing the slender model stepping out in short top and suspenders, with a…bowler hat?

“Hmm,” said Sandy. Svetlana jumped around to the music, to applause and exclamation.

“I don't know if she's quite got the presentation down,” Togo suggested.

“Not her fault, no one ever taught her how to dance.”

“Sandy!” Svetlana yelled across the noise. “What do you think?”

“Suspenders great!” Sandy replied, thumb up. “Not sure about the hat though!”

“Nor if she's quite got the idea of ladylike volumes of conversation,” Togo added, very amused.

“Oh, I hope she never gets that,” said Sandy. “I hate it, all these demure girls who stare at the ground when they walk by. I want to tell them they'll walk into something.” As Svetlana set about exchanging hats and taking new suggestions.

Togo laughed. “With you as a role model, I don't think you have to worry she'll grow up shy.”

Sandy smiled. “Maybe.” But then, she had advantages the kids didn't. Suddenly it worried her. Was she setting a bad example? Would they try to be like her? In one vital respect, they weren't, and never could be.

“Droze,” said Togo, more somberly. “Good lords, that poor child. Is it really that awful?”

“Really,” said Sandy. “She's lucky to be alive, they all are.”

“And let me guess, the Tanushan psychology mafia are going to give you all kinds of grief before they let your little darlings into schools with other Tanushan children.”

Sandy nodded, remembering Justice Rosa warning her of much the same. “She got into a fight today. With Canas security. No one did anything wrong, she just panicked and lashed out. She gets scared so easily.”

“So you brought her here, to show her a place with lots of people and no fear.” Togo smiled. “What a perfect idea.”

“They're going to say she's dangerous, Togo. Like they said I was dangerous. And they were right too, I
am
dangerous…but only in certain circumstances. And sometimes…I just think this system wants people to all be safe and normal and predictable, and not everyone is. And if we cut all those people out of society, and make everyone normal and safe and bland, we'll lose something really important.”

“Couldn't agree more,” said Togo, looking around at his crazy party.

“And she's just…she's
such
a good kid Togo, and…”

She was choking up, the sentence left unfinished. Togo was gazing at her, his eyes sparkling.

“Sandy,” he said, with the broadest smile and put a gentle hand to her shoulder. “
Wonderful
, Sandy. Wonderful.”

Meaning that emotion and what it meant. Sandy smiled sheepishly.

“Not so tough, huh?” she managed.

“Never so tough,” he beamed. “Not to me.”

Sandy told the cruiser to come and meet them at eleven, which she figured wasn't so late it made her a bad parent. But with Safdajung city crowds, the cruiser was going to take a good twenty minutes to reach them. After they'd said good-bye to new friends and old, with lots of hugs for Svetlana, the cruiser was still stuck in the parking lot traffic. They walked to it, past patrons exiting restaurants and clubs and others wandering in, their evening
just beginning. Coloured lights blazed off the puddles of recent rain, as the occasional car hissed by on slow, wet tires.

“Thank you for taking me out,” said Svetlana happily. “I had fun.”

“Excellent,” said Sandy, holding her hand. “You deserve to have fun. We'll find some more fun things for your brothers to come and do as well.”

Svetlana giggled. “Danya would have hated that party so much! Changing clothes, I mean, god, it's so pointless!” They both laughed.

“Kiril would have liked it though.”

“Yeah, true,” said Svetlana. “Let's bring him next time.”

“Deal, but only if you think really hard about some fun things we can find Danya to do on his own.” Svetlana frowned. “His entire life has been about looking after you guys, and I'm sure he always will. But he also deserves to have some fun for himself, like you had tonight, don't you think?”

“Yes!” said Svetlana, nodding vigorously. “Absolutely.” And frowned again, thinking. “But what would Danya like to do on his own?”

“Think about it,” Sandy repeated. “I need your advice with that, you know him better than anyone.”

Svetlana thought for a moment, shoes splashing in puddles. “This is because I killed those people, isn't it?” Sandy looked at her in concern. “I mean, in the interview the other day, they were asking me about it. Danya and Kiril never killed anyone, but I did.”

“Killing is a very serious thing, Svet. It's the most serious thing.”

“You do it.”

“I'm an adult. And I work in security, and sometimes it can't be helped. But you're a child, and people here find it hard to conceive that a child might kill someone.”

“I didn't have a choice!” Crossly. “They were going to take Danya!”

“Hush, Svet.” She put a hand on her head. “I know. I think you did the right thing. I'm certain of it.” Hell of a thing to tell a child. Tanusha's psychologists were going to be horrified at
her
now.
What are you trying to do, encourage her?
But it was the truth. “And you know what? I've killed a lot of people. Most of them deserved it. With none of them did I really have a choice. It was my job, you see, and…well, you know what I am, and what I was designed to do.”

“I know,” said the girl, looking up at her with big eyes. “You were made for it; you didn't have a choice.”

“Right. But you listen to this.” She stopped and crouched with her back to the wall so she could look Svetlana in the eyes. “I killed some people when I first arrived on Callay. They were working for a big federal agency back then, this was before Callay was the central world of the Federation. And…and they did terrible things to me. They cut me up.” Svetlana looked horrified. “I don't want to tell you that story now, it's not the time, and to tell the truth, I don't like talking about it. But I healed up, and with some good friends—this was when I met Vanessa—we went after some of these people, and I ended up killing some of them.”

“Good!” said Svetlana hotly.

Sandy nodded, licking dry lips. “Yes. They killed a lot of innocent people; it wasn't just that they hurt me. If anyone deserved it, they did. But later, I was looking at some of their personnel files, those are things that tell who they are and where they're from…and I saw that each of these people had families. They had brothers and sisters, just like you have Danya and Kiril. And they had mothers and fathers, who presumably loved them…”

“That doesn't give them the right to take other people away from
their
mothers and fathers!”